I. Ron Ops is an Artificial Private Investigator, a robot created to be the ultimate hardboiled shamus. I. Ron works in Space Station Omega, a floating world of vice and crime, and he'll need more than metal to suceed in a world of dames, aliens and more.

Being a detective is a dirty job. I
do not use to 'dirty' in the literal sense, though detective work
does often force one to compromise one's exterior cleanliness, but
in the figurative sense. 'Dirty' is a common colloquialism for
when something is unappealing, difficult, and problematic, and
private investigation is indeed all of those things. However, there
is another common colloquialism that presents an interesting
corollary to my first statement – it's a dirty job, but
somebody's got to do it.

I was built for that job. My
designation is Iglitz Ronald Ops, also known as I. Ron Ops, and I am
the first Artificial Private Investigator, or A.P.I. As a completely
synthetic sleuth, I possess a steel body of excellent durability and
a highly advanced positronic brain with access to the Interstellarnet
containing the sum of the galaxy's knowledge. I can interface
directly with all forms of technology, making me a 'Detechtive'
of rare and skill and power. I also possess an acute sense of smell.
I resemble a tall humanoid with shining metal skin, and an oval face
with two large yellow eyes. I frequently dress in garments that are
appropriate for detectives, such as a battered trench coat and a
pearl gray fedora.

Despite my advanced nature, I must
admit that there are many mysteries that have proven baffling. Most
of these concern a code of conduct that seems irrational, and
illogical, if not wholly bizarre, which is known as 'human nature.'
Let me offer an example:

One afternoon, I was in my office
playing chess with my creator, and he was allowing me to win. My
creator is twelve-year-old boy genius Nathan Iglitz, son of Jeremiah
Iglitz, the owner of Iglitz Labs, the multi-planet spanning
mega-conglomerate. We sat on opposite sides of my desk in my
alabaster white office, which maintains the spotlessness and neatness
of a supercomputer's main processing unit, with the holographic
chessboard between us. Nathan was intelligent enough to defeat even
me, but today his pieces were few and in approximately six moves I
deduced I would have checkmate.

"Master Iglitz," I said,
looking up from the board at Nathan. "I have detected that you are
allowing me to win."

Nathan did not meet my blaring
eyes. He wore thick spectacles and a neat white coat, vest and tie.
"Is it that obvious, I. Ron?" he asked in his thin voice, running
a hand through his neat brown hair.

"Not to the casual observer, but
I have calculated that you have made approximately four moves that
weakened your position. I could replay them to you if you have any
doubts as to the veracity of my statements."

"No, I. Ron, you're right."
He sighed as he held a shimmering rook hologram between two thin
fingers. "I just figured that well, I always win, and I thought
you'd be really happy if you won a game. I thought you'd like
it."

"Oh." I considered this
information. "This is strange, Master Iglitz. Why would you wish to
harm your own standing? Why would you put yourself in jeopardy for no
gain, except to me?"

There was that word again. I had
heard it used to explain such mysteries an estimated forty thousand
times since the inception of my consciousness, and yet it remained
strange. I was about to inquire to Nathan if he would gain enjoyment
from having me defeat him in another competition, such as horseshoes,
when the holocom in the corner of my alabaster desk buzzed. Shirley
Sparks, my secretary, had a message for me.

My secretary's face appeared,
bathed in blue light and hovering a little off of the desk. "Mr.
Ops?" she asked. She had a spherical face with red hair in curls,
and she wore a sleek silver sweater. "There's a fellow wants to
see you. It looks like this bird's got a lot of money, so we'd
better powwow with him right away."

"You assessment is accurate," I
said. "Please, show him in. Also, bringing some cups of Mercury
Spiced Coffee for our guest and Master Iglitz would be an acceptable
secondary course of action."

The sliding doors opened and a
fellow of exceptional girth and roundness entered my office, moving
at a pace reminiscent of a duck or a similar waterfowl. He was bald
and his cheeks looked like gasbags that had been recently been
inflated, but recently, the aforementioned gas had escaped and now
they were limp. He wore a seersucker suit, and held a bowler hat in
his hands.

"Detechtive Ops," he said, his
voice deep and throaty. "My name is Montgomery Hatch, owner of
Egghead Technologies. I need your help."

"You have arrived at the proper
locations for requests of that kind," I said.

"Huh?" Hatch asked, squinting
so that his data-monocle flickered like a dying star.

"You've come to right place,"
Nathan explained. "How can we help you, sir?"

Hatch nodded, and reached into his
coat. "All right, robot, let me introduce myself. I'm a very
important man. Egghead Technologies rivals Iglitz Labs in scope, and
we got exclusive deals with the Martian States, the Terran
Federation, and the Star Union. Here on Space Station Omega, I'm
what the papers call a noteworthy citizen."

The door slid open again, and
Shirley Sparks came inside, holding up a tray with three steaming
mugs of amber-colored coffee. "Hey, you're Monty Hatch!" she
said, grinning as she offered him a cup. "You're a pretty big
cheese, Mr. Hatch."

While they had been talking, I ran
Montgomery Hatch's name and appearance through a quick search of
the Interstellarnet's databanks. Though Hatch was neither
particularly gargantuan nor a dairy product, he was a man of great
wealth and political power. I wondered what exactly he was doing
here, and then I noticed a constant presence at his side in numerous
press photos, who had fewer and fewer appearances as time passed by.
I made a quick guess.

"You're here about your
daughter, Henrietta Hatch?" I queried.

Hatch's eyes glared at me.
"Yeah…" he said. "Boy, you are a smart one. And you'll have
to be for what I got in mind. Now, it ain't no secret me and my
little girl have been having some disagreements lately. All her life
I've tried to shield her from the rest of the galaxy, and all that
made her do was want it more." He sighed. "She's been running
with a bad crowd lately, from the lower decks of the Space Station --
cyborgs, criminals, aliens, for Christ's sake!" He shook his
head. "I got her away from that spaceway trash and back in our
manor on the upper decks, but then I get a visit from this guy." He
blinked his eye, signaling his data-monocle to project a
postcard-sized picture of a Martian Ratman in a cheap, second-hand
suit.

The Ratman had narrow red eyes,
dark fur that resembled coal, and a grin that in-depth cultural
analysis of the expressions of his species allowed me to classify as
'confident and happy.' I scanned the picture through the police
databases of every known country, city-state and polity in the
universe.

"This mug is called—"

"Jimmy the Rat," I announced,
having located his most widely used alias. "He has been in and out
of prisons 6.5 times for various charges including breaking and
entering, assault, holocable theft, and racketeering. I believe he
would best be classified as a small-time thug."

"Add blackmail to that list,"
Montgomery Hatch said. "He shows up with pictures of my daughter
in…ah…bad positions, and says that I unless I do exactly as his
boss tells me, he's gonna mail them to every gossip rag and society
scandal sheet in the space station!" He pointed a thick finger at
me. "I want you to find this rat boy and get me those pictures.
I'll double your fee, pay full expenses, anything – just get me
those damn pictures!"

"I accept your terms," I said.
"But please, can you clarify your use of the word 'bad'?"

Nathan raised a hand. "Maybe he
means like, she fell down the stairs or spilled food on her shirt or
something?"

"That must be it." Shirley
patted Mr. Hatch on the shoulder. "You know where your daughter
used to hang out? Maybe where she bumped into this rat guy?"

"The Stardust Club, down in the
Tyger Bay loading dock," Hatch explained. "I bet you dollars to
doughnuts that's where you'll find them."

"I will not take your bet," I
said. "But I will take your case."

Hatch nodded. "Great. I'll be
in touch." The sliding doors opened and let him out of my spotless
white office. I stood up as well, adjusting my coat around my round
shoulders. I signaled the top drawer in my desk to open, revealing a
Mark IV Ray Pistol with spare power batteries. I put them in my
shoulder-holster. The probability of trouble was very high.

"Going there will not be
dangerous," I corrected. "I will take the personal transport
tubes, which have had a total of only 3.4 accidents during the
entirety of Space Station Omega's history." Then I adjusted my
hat and I was off.

The trip through the personal
transport tubes took exactly one hour, thirty-three minutes and forty
seconds. I sat calmly inside of the tube, feeling the air rush by as
I saw the shining skyscrapers and palaces of Space Station Omega's
upper deck giving way to the glittering neon smoke of the lower deck.
I will now divulge information about Space Station Omega: It is an
artificial satellite the size of a small moon, which flies across the
Milky Way, ignoring borders and maintaining its own government. As
such, it is the perfect place for all kinds of criminals looking to
lay low. In addition, it is one of the universe's most successful
off-planet tax shelters and countless large megacorporations have
made their headquarters here. Some of the galaxy's richest beings
choose to live here, or spend time in the numerous resorts.

With a population made up of a
small upper class of the super-rich and a large lower class made up
mostly of the criminal elements, Space Station Omega is perhaps the
perfect place for a detective. If I believed in the concept as 'luck'
then I would consider myself lucky.

The transport tubes dropped me off
at Tyger Bay. I had already downloaded a map to the Stardust Club and
made my way down the narrow chrome street. A few hovercars sped by,
whining loudly. A drunk spaceman lay on the sidewalk in a pile of his
own waste. I was asked to perform immoral activities with assorted
women, lovebots, and genderless aliens approximately 6.3 times before
I reached the Stardust Club. I walked in through the sliding doors
and stepped inside.

The place was full of smoke, but it
was quite big and mostly empty. Chrome, star-shaped tables were set
across a dirty floor. A couple of drunken spacemen were singing
obscene star shanties in the corner, at such a volume as to cause
annoyance to my auditory sensors. I walked passed the jukebox
squatting in the corner and approached the bar. The bartender was
pink-skinned, a multi-armed native of Rigel. The tufts of fur on his
arms wiggled in apprehensions as I approached.

"Hey there," he said. "What I
can get you?"

"Information regarding the
whereabouts of this individual." I flashed him the picture of Jimmy
the Rat from a projector located in my left eye. "Or information
regarding the activity of this individual." I used the projector in
my right eye to show him a picture of Henrietta Hatch.

"Look, pal, I just tend bar here,
okay?" he asked. "I can't be asked to keep a file on every mug
who walks in here looking to coat their throat with a little Uranian
liquor." He leaned forward, his voice dropping to a whisper. "But
I have seen the dame. Give me a sawbuck and I'll tell you were."

"That is an acceptable
transaction," I stated. I reached into my pocket to withdraw the
necessary currency, when the barman's three eyes focused on
something behind me, then widened with surprise. I turned around and
saw two individuals facing me, both dressed in faux tiger-skin suits
and matching fedoras. One was a tall fellow with a curling scar on
his face. The other was a large humanoid lizard, of the kind native
to the asteroid fields, with mottled tan scales, a forked tongue and
long curling claws. I noted the muscles shifting under his suit,
resembling the bulky components of heavy machinery.

The scar-faced man jabbed a finger
at my chest. "You shouldn't be asking questions, metal boy," he
said. "Why don't you go and get lost?"

"That would be an impossibility,"
I stated. "Due to the detailed maps of Space Station Omega
contained in my internal databases."

"Oh, a wise guy, eh?" He
cracked his knuckles, and I noted the many multicolored rings he wore
on his fingers. "What do you say, Snesss, we gonna break this
palooka in half or what?"

"Thank for recognizing my
intelligence," I said, already uploading a combat routine. "You
will not be able to break me in half but you may try."

The small man swung at me. I let
his fist strike my midsection and heard exactly three of his knuckles
crack. He yelled in pain and then I delivered a punch directly to the
underside of his jaw. He tumbled backwards, and four of his teeth
clattered to the floor. The lizardman came at me next, both claws
held high. I sidestepped his attack, grabbed his neck and rammed his
head into the bar. It seemed to cause him discomfort, so I did it
again.

A soft arm on my shoulder
restrained me. I stopped. "Please, let him go!" a feminine voice
cried. Curious, I did as I was directed, then turned to look at her.

She was an extremely attractive
human female. Her eyes were a deep shade of blue. Her hair was blonde
and seemed to glow like a hologram. Her legs were long and smooth,
like a long structure of exceptional smoothness. "There's no call
for causing trouble," she said, standing very close to me. She wore
a black skirt that was very short. "My name's Luna Lupo. I'm
the girlfriend of the guy who owns this joint. What do you want?"

"Information," I said. I showed
her the images of Jimmy the Rat and Henrietta Hatch. "Pertaining to
these individuals. My designation is I. Ron Ops. I am an A.P.I."

"Oh…" she said. She rested a
hand on my chest. "Hmmm," she said. "Hard."

"That is because it is made of
steel," I stated.

Luna looked up at me. "There a
heart in there, tin man?" she asked.

"Of a mechanical variety," I
agreed.

"Hmmm." The noise she made was
reminiscent of a Terran cat purring. "Look, tin man, why don't
you come upstairs to my suite and I'll tell you everything you want
to know." She put a finger on my lips. "Provided you're a good
little boy."

"I will try my best to shrink
myself in age and size," I said. I followed her away from the bar
and to the stairwell in the corner. We walked up the stairs and she
unlocked the door in front of us, leading us to a luxuriously
furnished room with wide glass window overlooking the depths of
space. The carpet was made from the hair of a Neptunian Sharkbear,
and wide mirrors covered the other wall, reflecting the stars and
planets. Another window gave a good view of the dingy street below
us.

Luna Lupo sat
down in a bubble chair that swung from the ceiling and folded her
legs. She pointed with a red fingernail to the drink cabinet in the
corner. "Make me a drink, will you?" she asked.

"I would be happy to Miss Luna,"
I said. "Drink mixing is included within my programming." I
opened the cabinet and selected a shot glass. "What would you like
to have?"

"Hmmm." She repeated the
previous purring noise. "Make it a Nebula Burner, extra gin and on
the rocks. I like things like that, you know. Sweet, but with a
spark to them." She snapped her fingers and a stereo started to
play, filling the room with slow jazz music. I finished making her
the drink and handed her the cup. "Why don't you take off your
hat and coat?" she asked.

"Should I be prepared to spend a
great deal of time here?" I queried.

"Who knows? You might like it."

"I might." I stood up and
removed my hat and coat, setting them on a wooden stand in the
corner, next to a potted Venusian glowleaf with bright red stalks. I
projected the two images of Jimmy the Rat and Henrietta Hatch to
Luna. "Can you give me any information on these two?"

"Never seen the rat before,"
she said. "But I know the little mouse. She used to hang around
here, drinking down below. She liked her drinks sweet but with a
spark too, if memory serves."

At that moment, there came a loud
rapping on the door and a voice as loud and abrasive as an alarm. It
was deep, low and grating. "Open up, doll! Daddy's home, so open
the hell up!" The knocking continued. "I ain't in the mood for
waiting, toots!"

"Cripes!" Luna came to her feet
and ran to me. "Gurg'le'gurg's home!" She ran to the corner
and opened a closet. "Get in there quickly, and don't make a
noise!"

I followed her instructions. The
closet had a series of wooden blinds and I could peer through to
watch her run to the door. She opened it and stepped back, smiling as
if she was extremely happy. "Gurg!" she said. "I didn't know
you were stopping by."

"Yeah, yeah.
Can it, sister." Gurg'le'gurg slid into the room on a trail of
slime. He was a Venusian Slug, with a body composed of green mucus,
two arms with stubby, dripping fingers, and a pair of eyestalks
ending in angry, red-rimmed orbs. He wore a dark suit with a bright
orange bowtie, and a glowing rose in his lapel. "Holy Hive-Mother,
I've had a hell of a day." A fat cigar exuded yellow smoke in his
mouth.

Two large thugs
followed him into the room, both identical toughs in matching black
suits and fedoras. Gurg waved a hand at them. "You know the boys,
Luna? Course you do. Hurry up and fix me a drink, will you?" He
slid into one of the chairs, pulling his tail off of the floor and
letting thick ropes of slime remain on the carpet.

I did not have
to update my database to inform myself about Gurg'le'gurg. He was
the primary crime lord in Space Station Omega, a gangster king who
ruled the lower decks through intimidation, political connections and
outright violence. It was not a surprise to find that he controlled
the Stardust Club as well.

"It's this
damn Mr. Talos," Gurg said, beckoning for Luna to bring him his
drink. He gulped it down and grinned. "Bastard thinks he can run my
turf, thinks he can toss me out of my own space station! I'll show
him! Pull out the bum's guts and feed them to the Plutonian
bladebeasts!"

"Mr. Talos?"
Luna asked. "I ain't heard of no one by that name." Neither had
I, though I searched my databases several times.

"Some chump
from Jupiter, used to run some rackets around the Great Red Spot and
now thinks he's some kind of goddamn big shot. Been trying to
muscle in for a while now, and it kills me to say it, but the bum's
been having a little success." His eyestalks flexed. "It's like
he's got someone in my outfit, selling him all my secrets…"
Suddenly, his eyeballs turned completely around. It was as if someone
had done something to him causing great discomfort. "Hey…" he
growled.

Luna noticed it
too. "What's a matter, darling?" she asked. "The drink
not---"

"Forget the
damn booze! That's a man's trench coat and hat hanging there and
it sure as hell ain't mind!" He leapt up from the chair, his two
thugs flanking him. He grabbed Luna's throat. "You been screwing
around, you lousy dame! That it? Think you can pull one over on
Gurg'le'gurg? Well, I wasn't spawned yesterday, sister, and by
God, I'll make sure you know it!" Gurg's two guards watched the
performance like they had seen it many times and were used to it.

He threw her to
the ground, slamming her hard into the hovering glass tabletop. Luna
Lupo was obviously in great distress. "Please, Gurg!" she cried,
lying on the ground amidst shattered glass. "I didn't mean no
harm!"

"The hell you
did, you loopy dame!" Gurg'le'gurg pressed the end of his slimy
tail on her chest. "I ought to let you choke on my own slime! Now
tell me where he is? Where is your lover boy, huh?"

The motivation
for my next action is confusing. I knew that if I emerged from my
hiding place, there would be trouble, both for me, and Luna and the
success of the case. But part of my programming, the part that dealt
with basic morality, screamed at me to help her. A self-preservation
subroutine started automatically, warning me of the consequences of
my actions. I shut it down, and then stepped into the room.

"My location
is obvious," I announced.

Gurg and his
guards looked at me. Gurg'le'gurg flashed a smile of countless,
needle-like teeth. "So, you've been messing with a metal-head,
eh? Can't say I'm surprised. You always wanted your lover
programmable." He looked back at me. "Not looking too good for
you, pal."

"That all
depends on one's position," I stated. I walked over to the corner
and retrieved my coat and hat, careful to cover my shoulder-holster.
"From my position, my prospects seem very good." As I raised my
fists, I decided it was time to utilize an insulting taunt to cause
my foes fear and distress. "Why don't I apply my fists to you
multiple times and cause pain and trauma?" I asked.

"Get a load of
this bucket of bolts!" Gurg laughed. He waved a slimy hand at his
underlings. "Tear him apart!"

One struck my
face, hard enough to cause my visual sensors to bend and blur. I
delivered a solid punch to his midsection, but he did not go down. He
may have been genetically augmented for combat. I decided to scan him
quickly, and that's when the other one of Gurg's thugs pulled an
electrified baton out of nowhere and slammed it into my back.

I do not know
where he produced the weapon. Perhaps he carried a nanopocket device,
allowing him to conceal a variety of large weapon on his person. But
the electricity carried across my body and made several of my
circuits burn. I sank to the ground and received a kick that sent me
into the window overlooking the street.

"Don't hurt
him, Gurg!" I heard Luna cry.

"Ain't gonna
hurt him!" Gurg laughed, motioning to one of his thugs. The muscled
stooge reached into his coat, presumably for another nanopocket. "I'm
just gonna ask him to leave!"

I reached for my
ray gun. I managed to get it halfway out of its holster before Gurg's
man handed his boss an atomic-powered submachine gun, or atommy gun.
Before I could fire, Gurg fired exactly 32 uranium tipped bullets
from the weapon's drum magazine into my midsection, and an
additional ten into my skull. I went out of the window and down into
the dirty alley, where the damage caused my systems to immediately
cease functioning.

After a few
moments of recovery, they rebooted. My vision sensors winked on, and
I saw that was I was in a dirty prison cell. I sat up, and let my
internal software locate me. I found that I was in the drunk tank of
the third precinct police station. My only companion in the dark cell
was an insect being from Alpha Centauri. He smelled worse than the
worst smelling thing in existence. For precisely twenty-six minutes
and four seconds I was forced to sit there and wait, and then I heard
boots coming down the hall.

I looked up and
saw Police Chief Meechuzz McGee, the man responsible for security in
Space Station Omega, walking down towards my cell with two other
officers. He wore a blue uniform over purple Plutonian skin, and
looked me over with his green bulging eyes. "I. Ron?" he asked.
"That you?"

"That is my
designation," I agreed. "Can you release me?" Iglitz Labs had
worked to cultivate good relations with the police. As the Space
Station Omega police were extremely corrupt, that was not difficult.

"Sure thing,
pal!" Chief McGee clapped his hands, causing the metal gate to
slide open. I stood up and walked out. Each step made sparks of pain
shoot up my diodes, but I ignored all discomfort. McGee put a flabby
hand on my round shoulder. "You know me, I. Ron, always ready to
help out a friend in need." His grin increased by several
centimeters. "And you remember to bring that up to your boss,
right, buddy?"

"It will be
noted," I said. We walked out of the holding cells and through the
main office. A group of busy officers dealt with a constantly
increasing stream of convicts, processing arrests on old computers,
arrested individuals loudly lamenting their situations, and officers
laughing about their latest bribes and brutality.

McGee stepped in
front of me as we approached the door. "Now, I'm just the police
chief around here, so don't mind me or nothing, but would you mind
telling me what you were doing, lying on the street with two dozen
uranium-tipped slugs in you?"

"Being
stationary," I replied. I paused. "Perhaps you can answer this
query. Have you heard of a crime boss named Mr. Talos?"

"Talos? Sure."
McGee nodded. "He supposedly came out of nowhere, had the Great Red
Spot running just the way he liked it after a couple weeks, killed
every man that got in his way, often broke their necks with his bare
hands. One tough hood." He whistled. "And now he's come here.
Matter of fact, he took out one of Gurg's bars down on Diamond
Street just this afternoon. Disintegrated the limbs of everyone
inside and cut up what was left. Damndest thing I ever saw. They say
he brought a couple hardcore mercenaries with him, augmented Japanese
killers – Electroninjas. Bad news, and that's a fact."

"How could he
succeed in doing battle with Gurg'le'gurg?" I asked.

"Beats me."
McGee shrugged. "Nobody asks me or nothing, but I think Talos has a
man on the inside of Gurg's mob, some stoolie ratting out all of
Gurg's secrets." We had reached the door and McGee extended a
purple hand. "Well, see you around, I. Ron. Keep out of trouble?"

"On the
contrary," I replied. "I intend to be searching for varying
degrees of trouble in the near future." My dialogue circuitry came
up with that line, believing that it would be appropriate, but from
McGee's smile, I could tell it didn't quite work. I waved goodbye
to him and stepped outside onto the dirty sidewalk.

I looked up at
the great glass dome that covered Space Station Omega. Artificial day
had given way to the darkness of the void. I opened a holocom channel
to my office, and found that Nathan Iglitz and Shirley Sparks had
been trying to contact me a total of six times. Their faces appeared
in front of me, both agitated.

"I. Ron!"
Nathan cried. "Are you okay? What happened? We weren't reading
you for a while."

"I encountered
some difficulty," I explained. "But my integrity has not been
compromised."

"Oh. That's
a relief." Nathan pointed to the holocom on my desk. "Oh, right.
There's some pretty big news. Mr. Hatch gave us another call and
said Jimmy the Rat visited him again. He gave the Rat a cheap payoff,
and Jimmy took off. Maybe you can follow him? I'll send you Hatch's
address. You could hack into the station's traffic cameras and
follow Jimmy's hovercar to wherever he's staying."

"An excellent
idea," I agreed. I initiated the hacking process. The security
systems used by Space Station Omega's traffic controllers were
fairly advanced. It took me 3.2 seconds to gain total access. I
spotted Jimmy the Rat, with his black fur, beady eyes and sharp claws
leaving Hatch's manor in the upper deck, and heading to his
hovercar. He sped downtown, to the bad neighborhoods. Not far from
where I was, actually.

As I started
walking, Shirley kept the channel open. "So, boss, what happened at
the Stardust Club?"

"I met a
woman," I explained. "She is the girlfriend of Gurg'le'gurg.
He owns the Stardust Club."

"Oh, so he's
mixed up in this?" Shirley paused. "Is she cute?"

"Extremely."

"Shirley!"
Nathan cried. "I. Ron is an extremely sophisticated artificial
intelligence. He doesn't deal with any of that stuff."

Shirley smiled.
"That, Nathan, honey, is what they all say." She looked back at
me. "You be careful, boss. This moll seems like bad news, and
anyone mixed up with a monster like Gurg is someone you want to steer
clear of. Keep focused on your job and don't take any risks, okay?"

"Noted," I
agreed. I had now reached the destination of Jimmy the Rat. It was a
towering, steel gray flophouse, with sagging floors and chipped
paint. "I'll see you soon," I told Nathan and Shirley, and
ended the holocom channel. I was created to be independent, like a
true private detective, so such an action did not go against my
programming. I prepared to enter the flophouse when a thin hand
grasped my shoulder.

I turned and
there she was – Luna Lupo. The case seemed to be growing more
complex at an exponential rate, and she had doubled the percentage of
complexity. She had a black eye and three bruises on her face. "I.
Ron," she said. "What are you doing here?"

"This is the
residence of Jimmy the Rat. He has the pictures of Henrietta Hatch
that I require," I explained. "Are you all right? You appear to
be in physical discomfort." That made my circuitry hum in anger.

"Yeah," she
said. "Gurg slapped me around pretty bad. But he filled you full of
lead and dropped you out of a window!"

"I am made of
resilient metal," I stated. "Perhaps you should seek help."

"Where am I
gonna go? The bulls? Gurg owns the police. Back with my folks on
Terra? They couldn't stand to see me." She looked away from me.
"You're a good guy, I. Ron. You popped out and tried to help me
when Gurg was beating on me, even though it meant getting ventilated.
But that just ain't how things in my life work."

Needles to say,
I was confused. "Is there another way I can help?"

She looked up at
me. "Help yourself," she said, and then turned away. I considered
running after her, but I remembered the case and Jimmy the Rat. I
turned away and walked into the flophouse's lobby. I tasted the
stale air and the rotten smells. Five units of currency to the bored
manager gave me the number of Jimmy the Rat's room. I took the
elevator, and it creaked along like a broken computer overloaded with
viruses and faulty wiring before dropping me off on the sixth floor.

Then I found
Jimmy the Rat's room. My self-preservation sub-routine started up
again, telling me to play it quiet. I ignored it. I kicked the door
open and stepped inside. The place was a mess, and Jimmy the Rat spun
to face me. He was at a desk covered in scraps of paper, behind a
stained couch. A wide window overlooked the city, so dusty that it
would make the sun gray.

Jimmy went for a
double-barreled plasma cannon under his desk, and I went for my ray
gun. Soon we both had our weapons pointed at each other. I looked at
the muzzle of his plasma cannon and ran through my options.

"Drop that
heater!" he squeaked. He was extremely nervous, the whiskers on his
face shaking rapidly. "Drop it or I'll plug you!"

"There is a
fallacy commonly followed by organic creatures," I said. "That
holding a weapon means mastery over our things." I tossed down my
ray gun. Jimmy the Rat dove for it, allowing me to drive my foot into
his chin. He tumbled to the ground and I picked up the plasma cannon.
I racked it and slammed it into his face. "Where are the pictures
of Henrietta Hatch?" I asked.

I slammed the
shotgun's muzzle into his mouth. Preprogrammed mercy protocols told
me to stop. I ignored them. I pulled the gun out and let him lie on
the ground. "You have an estimated 3/4ths of your teeth remaining,"
I told Jimmy. "Would you like to lose more?"

"All right!
They're in the desk! They're in the desk!"

I walked over to
the desk and opened it. Sure enough, six photos were there, inside an
envelope. I scanned each one and found that they did indeed show
Henrietta Hatch in very bad positions. I tucked the photos into my
coat.

So the case was
closed. I should have left and gone home to get some needed repairs.
But there was something stuck on my mind, standing out like a fat
mote on an otherwise spotless motherboard. It took me a picoseconds
to identify it – Luna Lupo. I looked down at Jimmy.

"Who do you
work for?" I asked.

"Jesus, he'll
kill me!' Jimmy whined. "Look, brother, I gave you what you want,
now leave me be!"

"Who is it?"
I asked, raising the plasma cannon.

"Gurg'le'gurg!"
he cried. Somehow, that didn't surprise me.

It was at that
moment that approximately 40.2 cracks appeared on the window
overlooking the street. The glass shattered inwards, and several
black blurs darted inside. I switched to high-speed vision and
scanned them as I brought up my plasma cannon. In the 3.3 seconds it
took them to strike, I saw that they were five of the Electroninjas
whom Chief McGee had mentioned.

They were men,
but augmented with metal bones, computer-controlled synapses and
armed with laser katanas. They wore black suits, black masks, red
goggles and whisper-quiet jetpacks. Something told me events were
about to proceed in a direction that I would not like. I raised the
plasma cannon and fired both barrels.

I blew one of
the ninjas in half, letting a wide red beam of plasma carve through
his waist. Another Electroninja came towards me, laser katana held
back to divide my head in two or more pieces. I shot him through the
skull, but his feet connected with my chest and knocked me to the
ground. The plasma shotgun was now out of ammo. I felt like a
non-waterproof robot about to take a swim.

I raised the ray
gun, but a laser katana came down and my arm left my body in a shower
of sparks. I stared at my elbow, the edge still burning red and then
looked at my severed arm. I tried to stand, but another slash of the
katana took off my left leg.

For a few
seconds, there was quiet. The Electroninjas kept their swords pointed
at me and Jimmy the Rat, who crouched in the corner and whimpered. I
grabbed my arm and leg and tucked them under my remaining arm. Then,
another jetpack signaled someone else entering Jimmy's apartment.

He wore a red
leather trench coat and a black ski-mask, wrapped round with a pair
of red goggles. His landed on the fire-escape and walked inside, then
ignored Jimmy the Rat and approached me. "Well, well, well," he
said, reaching down and grabbing my neck. "What have we here?"

"My
designation is—"

"I know who
you are. And I bet you know who I am – Mr. Talos." His hand was
colder than the coldest thing in the universe multiplied to the power
of cold. "You're I. Ron Ops, the ferrite flatfoot. I gotta say, I
was pretty curious about you. Supposed to be pretty mean with your
fists."

"Such a
description is truthful," I said. "Allow me to re-attach my arm
and I will give you a demonstration."

He threw me to
the ground. "Don't smart me!" he shouted. He turned to Jimmy
the Rat. "All right, where are the pictures?"

Jimmy shook his
head. "He took them! The robot did! Please, don't—"

"Lousy organic
punk!" Talos approached Jimmy the Rat and hauled him off of the
ground. "I ought to crush you all under my heel! And I will!" He
grabbed Jimmy's neck and squeezed for approximately two minutes and
three seconds, then tossed the dead rat to the ground. Mr. Talos
removed his goggles and mask, and I analyzed his face. It was a
chrome steel oval, with two glaring red eyes. He was a robot, of a
similar build to myself. He tossed down Jimmy's body. "Lousy
organics," he muttered. "Thinking they're better than us.
Thinking they got the right to order us around. You know what I like
to do with organics?"

"Please, tell
me," I queried.

"Break them.
Then run this stinking city like a king." Mr. Talos looked back at
me. "Now, I know you got programming telling you to protect people,
so I'm not gonna ask you to try and override me. But I am gonna
tell you to stay the hell out of my way. Now hand over the pictures."

"Why do you
want them?" I sent a message to my office, urging Shirley to pick
me up. She could track me from the office, so I did not have to giver
her coordinates. Still, Shirley asked me where I wanted to be picked
up.

"I'm the one
in charge, I. Ron!" he growled. "Now hand them over!"

"No." I told
Shirley that she should pick me up off the street. Then I dove for
the window. For the second time in approximately six hours,
thirty-three minutes, and twenty-six seconds, I fell. This time, it
was five stories down and when I hit the sidewalk I went into
immediate shutdown.

I rebooted and
found myself looking up at the spotless white ceiling of my office.
The memories flooded back to me as I looked around. I saw that my leg
had already been re-attached and Nathan stood next to me, working on
my arm. He was using a remote operated wielder and was controlling
with careful instructions. I saw that the envelope containing the
pictures of Montgomery Hatch's daughter were on the desk.

"Oh!" Nathan
cried. "You're awake. How are you feeling?"

"My tactile
senses are at their norm," I stated. "Shirley found me?"

"That's
right, I. Ron. Boy, you were beaten up pretty bad. But you got the
photos and made it here. Miss Sparks wouldn't let me see them, so I
guess they must be pretty bad." He pulled back the wielder and
connected a wire into my arm. "I'll just bring your reflexes
back. Oh, and I opened your chest and took out a bunch of uranium
slugs that were in there. I guess you got shot."

"That is
correct," I said. I swiveled my head so I could watch Nathan work.
"Master Iglitz, may I ask you a question?"

"Of course, I.
Ron. Anything I can do to help."

"The woman I
told you about, Luna Lupo. I have a desire to protect her, to keep
her safe from Gurg'le'gurg," I stated. "This desire is
illogical. It is dangerous. I can conceive of seven separate
scenarios where it leads to my destruction. And yet it remains."

"Well, gee, I.
Ron, that's kind of tough," Nathan said. "When I built you, I
did give you as much as an adult male mind as I could. I decided that
a good detective would have to have some emotions in him, and I think
it's helped you. Would you like me to change your brain, take them
away?"

Control returned
to my arm, and I flexed it as I sat up. "No," I said. "I
believe they make me stronger as well."

Shirley walked
into the office then, and gave me a wave. "Hi, boss," she said.
"Lying down on the job?"

I hopped off of
the table. "Not any more," I said. "Any developments?"

"Nothing new.
I gave Hatch a ring. That big shot will be around to pick up his
pictures tomorrow afternoon." She grinned. "And I did a little
snooping of my own. Just some research, but I found some interesting
things about Gurg and the good Mr. Hatch."

"What did you
discover?" I asked.

"Turns out the
two of them are pretty close." Shirley ran her hand over my
desktop, bringing up a holographic display. It flipped through
several pictures of Gurg'le'gurg and Montgomery Hatch together
and upper class society functions. "Turns out he and Gurg were
suspected of working together. Gurg would launder dough, and Hatch
would invest in Gurg's smuggling and gunrunning. I guess
Gurg'le'gurg wanted more control over his partner."

"That explains
why Mr. Talos wanted the pictures too," I said. "He wanted a
similar control over Hatch's fortunes."

"Talos?"
Shirley asked. "He's that new gangster in town, right?"

"Correct. He's
a robot, actually, like me." I told them how he appeared in Jimmy
the Rat's apartment and hacked me to pieces.

"Nah, he don't
have the kind of hacking equipment you do," Shirley said. "And
even then, he wouldn't know your purpose. Did you tell anybody
else—" But she was interrupted by the holocom buzzing. I nodded
and it projected Luna's face above my desk. Her eyes were wide and
frightened.

I was frightened
too. "Luna!" I cried, with some urgency. "What is occurring?"

"It's Gurg,
I. Ron!" she cried. "Oh, god. He's worse than ever! He came
into the Stardust, frustrated about Talos and he tossed out all the
regulars. He's got a bunch of his boys with him, and they're all
looking for trouble. He's gonna take it out on me, I. Ron!"

"That will not
happen," I said. "I will get you and take you out of there." I
motioned to Shirley to bring me my coat and my shoulder-holster. "I
will ensure your safety."

"That's
sweet of you, I. Ron, but…" she trailed off and I saw her eyes
flash like a flickering screen. "Cripes! He's here!" The
holocom clicked off.

Shirley and
Nathan looked at me. "Maybe we should call the police?" Nathan
suggested.

"Gurg'le'gurg
controls them," I said. "I will solve this problem myself." I
put on my shoulder-holster and my coat, and then went to my desk. I
opened the lower drawer. Resting in its padded case was an atommy
gun, its drum magazine and a pair of plasma grenades. I took them
all, hiding the sub-gun under my coat. Nathan had ensured my combat
skills were in the highest percentile. I was literally a killing
machine. It was time to start acting like one.

"I will," I
said. I left the office and took the personal transport tube. It took
exactly one hour and twenty-three minutes, and each of the passing
seconds seemed to take an eternity. I thought about Luna, stuck in
the slimy paws of Gurg. I was going to hurt him.

The artificial
night was in its later half and the streets were empty. Soft neon
lights glowed from inside the Stardust Club. I walked to the doors
and took out the atommy gun, holding it loosely in one hand. In the
other, I grabbed a plasma grenade and fingered the pin. I stepped
inside.

Luna Lupo was
tied to a chair in the middle of the room. Gurg'le'gurg and
seventeen thugs of varying species, sizes and armaments stood around
here. The lizardman and his friend, as well as the two augmented
giants were there, fingering beamblades, plasma cannons, ray guns and
automatics. Luna's nose was bleeding, her head drooping like a
dying flower. All the beings in the room looked up and stared at me.

Gurg'le'gurg
was so angry his green slimy skin was turning red. "The steel
shamus! In my joint!" he snorted. "Good to have you, pal! I'm
gonna melt you to scrap and ooze over the pieces!"

"You will not
do so," I explained, reaching for the pin of the plasma bomb.
"Because you will be dead."

"Big talk."
He chomped down on his cigar. The men around him bristled.

"Not just
talk." I pulled the pin on the plasma bomb and tossed it into the
corner, then raised the atommy gun and opened fire. Targeting
software took over, directing my bursts of gunfire as the plasma
grenade exploded in a cloud of purple fire exactly .5 seconds later.
It scattered Gurg's men, and I mowed them down.

They tried to
fire back, and the air around me was full of lead, lasers and beams.
I was shot at exactly forty-three times, and hit five times, but
nowhere that could slow me down or do lasting damage. The lizardman
charged me, waving a beam-machete to cut me in half. I gave him a
burst between the eyes, scattering his brains into one hundred and
four individual pieces.

Gurg shouted
orders over the gunfire. "Kill him! Bring him down!" His men had
taken cover behind the bar, so I tossed them another plasma grenade.
Soon, they were blasted to bits. I moved on, letting out bursts at
anything that moved. Pretty soon I detected only two living things in
the Stardust Club – Luna, and Gurg.

He came charging
at me through the smoke, a snub-nosed ray gun in his slimy hand.
"Damn robot!" he shouted. "I'll tear you apart!" He fired
wildly, one shot burning through my shoulder. I still brought up the
atommy gun and opened fire, driving twenty-three bullets through his
slimy body. He sank down to the ground, still oozing forward and
trying to kill me. "Tear you apart…" he wheezed.

"No, you will
not." I gave him another burst through the head. His eyestalks
flopped to the ground. I shouldered the sub-gun and ran to Luna's
side. "Are you harmed?" I asked as I untied her. "Do you
require medical attention?"

"I'll be
okay," she said. She stood up and put her arms around my shoulders.
I felt all of my internal machinery hum a little faster. I was very
pleased that I had not asked Nathan to remove my emotional
programming. "You're a good guy, I. Ron."

"No." The
voice came from me behind me. I recognized it in a nanosecond. "He's
not a 'good guy.' He's not even organic trash. He's worse!"
It was Mr. Talos. I wanted to turn around and confront him, but then
I realized Luna had slapped a small patch to my back when she
embraced me. The patch sent small currents through my body,
initializing a total shutdown.

"I'm sorry,"
Luna said, and then I blinked into blackness.

When I rebooted,
I was lying on a maintenance platform overlooking one Space Station
Omega's plasma reactors. My arms were lashed to my sides with
several lengths of steel forcewire and my feet were similarly bound.
I looked up and saw Mr. Talos standing near the railing, the plasma
reactors behind him sending up ribbons of red and purple energy at
regular intervals. Luna Lupo stood next to him, and there was a third
person, a girl with her hands tied behind her and a gag over her
mouth. I identified her as Henrietta Hatch. Five Electroninjas stood
around us, their laser katanas glowing in their hands.

"Your
appreciation for the time of day is appropriate," I said. "For
this time is when you will be destroyed."

"Is that so?"
he asked. He patted Henrietta's shoulder. "I don't think so.
Matter of fact, I think I'm gonna run this floating hunk of space
junk from now on. I had my Electroninjas attack Hatch's mansion.
Figured, if I couldn't blackmail him with some dirty pictures, I'd
get the next best thing – his daughter."

"Such action
is profoundly stupid," I stated.

"Except it
ain't," he said. "You know what is? Going all screwy for a
dame, like you did! She got into your system like a Trojan Horse
virus! She was the one selling out Gurg's secrets, telling me
everything I wanted to know. I had her follow you, and soon as she
found out where Jimmy the Rat was holed up, she called me up and I
was right there." He arranged his simple features in something
approximating a grin. "She sold you out!"

I looked at
Luna. "Is that correct?"

She sighed.
"Gurg was a monster," she muttered. "I saw a way out. I took
it. You can't blame me for that."

"That is
true," I stated. "I cannot blame you for acting in a logical
matter. It was I who was following illogical emotions."

Mr. Talos
snorted. "All right, enough of this crap." He walked over to me
and grabbed my neck. "I'm tossing you into the reactor."

Luna ran to his
side. "Talos! You promised you wouldn't kill him!" Her eyes
were wide and she was in a state of great agitation.

"Hah!"
Talos's electronic voice made his laughter sound like a muffled
explosion. "You're as dumb as a first generation processor, you
stupid broad!"

"If that is
true," I said as he pushed me to the railing. "Then you are
dumber than a first generation processor." He slammed my back
against the railing, hard enough to damage the steel on my back. Far
below me, I could feel the heat of the plasma reactor, like a
miniature sun about to swallow me.

Talos stared at
me. "What are you talking about?" he asked.

"You didn't
bother to examine the software contained in my internal databases,"
I said. "Such software includes a tracking program, which I
initialized when I left my office. Another program lets me send text
messages to my office, and my secretary. She has alerted the police
as to Henrietta's whereabouts. The police will arrive in a matter
of minutes."

That made Talos
angry. He swung a fist into my face. My left eye cracked and I felt
my skull bend. "I'll kill you!" he shouted, his electronic
voice filled with pure rage. Footsteps sounded from down the
maintenance tunnel, followed by gunshots and shouts. Talos nodded and
his Electroninjas flew off to attack them. Henrietta moaned under her
gag. "So the bulls are here, eh?" Mr. Talos asked. "Won't
matter. Won't do you a kilobyte of good!"

My remaining eye
caught Luna's. She reached into her pocket and pulled out the
handle of a beam machete, a solid piece of metal big enough to hold
her in hand. She flicked it on, and a wide, glowing yellow blade of
pure energy emerged from the handle.

Maybe she had
taken it from one of the dead thugs in the Stardust Club. I did not
devote much thought to that, because then she raised the weapon and
swung it down. It cut the forcewire binding my arms. I was free. I
rammed a fist into Talos's chest, knocking him back. He glared at
me.

I reasoned it
was time for another threatening insult. "Why don't I apply my
fists to you multiple times and cause pain and trauma?" I asked.

"Why don't
you go to Hell?" he demanded and attacked. He struck me with a
right cross that shattered my cracked visual sensor. I caught him
under the chin, striking with the exact speed and force of a bullet
train. His head rocked back, but he grabbed my arm, then he drove his
knee into my chest, knocking me against the railing. The metal
railing broke, and I nearly toppled into the Plasma Reactor. He
pulled back both hands, about to send me over and to my immediate
termination.

Then I recalled
something – he hadn't bothered to take away my ray gun. I pulled
it from my shoulder-holster and fired, striking him in the arm. The
ray burned through the joint, and then I grabbed the arm and yanked
it off.

"Lousy…robot!"
he shouted, swinging at me with his remaining arm. I caught it and
pulled. He went over the railing, and down into the plasma reactor.

"You are the
lousy robot," I said, watching as he plummeted down into the red
and purple fire. He was reduced to ash within a nanosecond. I tossed
away his severed arm and looked at Luna. "What now?" I asked.

"Now…" she
whispered, depowering the beamblade. "Now I run for my life. Talos
has friends, and so does Gurg and the cops will want me…" From
down the hall, bursts of gunfire and pounding footsteps sounded the
arrival of Chief McGee and the cops. They would be arriving shortly.
"I gotta get out of town. I'll take a shuttle to the nearest
planet, head back to Terra from there. Try to find something in the
old neighborhoods."

"I could talk
to the police," I stated. "Explain the situation." But I could
tell she would not accept that. She reached around my arms and pulled
me close. I could feel every bit of heat coming from her body. "Do
you have a lack of trust for me?" I asked.

"Maybe, baby,"
she said. "I don't trust myself." She kissed me, and I felt the
warmth of her lips. My systems nearly overheated. Then she pulled
away and ran, dashing for a narrow shaft that led to the surface, and
away from the police.

After she left,
I approached Henrietta Hatch and undid her gag and ropes. She grinned
at me as she brushed back her brown hair. "Gee, thanks, mister,"
she said. "You saved my life." She smiled. "Say, you're kind
of cute." Henrietta looked after Luna. "Guess she didn't think
so."

"That is an
accurate assumption," I said. My opening statements are true. Being
a detective is a dirty job.

-The
End-

12

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